Marking deco tanks with duct tape or permanant labels?

[Daniel Dilley]

Hi Everyone

I was just wondering what different people are doing to mark stages/ deco tanks.

When i fill my tanks with my deco gasses i analyse them and label them with duct tape. I put a sticker with just MOD for my buddy and a smaller stcker with name, gas and MOD for me.

I see that it is common for people who have their own tanks to put a permant MOD stcker on them. I was wondering what agencies say to instructors in the standrds has to be done and tanks should be labelled how?

The downside i see to permanant stickers is for example if you ask for eanx50 and get eanx53 for example then the MOD changes and you cannot mark this on your tanks?


From what i understand from PADI is that even deco tanks containing nitrox should have mod etc biut also a yellow and green ntx sticker, a vis stcker and an o2 clean sticker. Do i understand correctly?

Any comments welcome.

Thanks
Daniel Dilley

 

[PfcAJ]

3% difference is tiddlywinks. Between the error of your analyzer and the error of your depth gauge, it doesn't matter. What DOES matter is switching to the wrong gas at depth or thinking you have a gas in a tank and its not that gas. Breathing the wrong gas at depth kills tech divers. 3% off on your analysis does not.

Stage and deco anks need to be dedicated to each gas and marked on each side in big bold numbers with MOD so you can see it and your buddy can see it. Analysis tape (with oxygen % to the decimal point, helium content, date of analysis and initials of who did the analysis) goes on the neck of the tank and is analyzed before a reg goes on it. I don't even take a tank out of the fill station without an analysis.

If you're doing a one-off dive where you need a different deco gas, a duct tape MOD sticker will suffice, but if you're doing that with any frequency buck up and buy another al80. Traveling often requires the duct tape thing but the same rule applies about dedicating tanks to a particular deco gas for the length of your trip.

Cylinder Marking & Gas Switching | WKPP

 

[Aeropilot]

Oh jeez, I first read the title as "Making deco tanks with duct tape"...

I know you can use it for anything, but still...

 

[rhwestfall]

From what i understand from PADI is that even deco tanks containing nitrox should have mod etc biut also a yellow and green ntx sticker, a vis stcker and an o2 clean sticker.

Sign, sign, everywhere a sign
Blockin' out the scenery, breakin' my mind
Do this, don't do that, can't you read the sign?​

 

[flots am]

I see that it is common for people who have their own tanks to put a permant MOD stcker on them. I was wondering what agencies say to instructors in the standrds has to be done and tanks should be labelled how?

The only time that works is if a particular tank always contains that mix and will never contain anything else. Some people dive this way, others don't.

• The MOD and/or O2% are for you and your buddy. Some places teach to use one or the other or both, depending on who trained you. I use both because I never know when I might have a sudden attack of "stupid" and it's easier to know if "I'm below 80'" than it is to try to remember my MOD for 40%, however I also like to know the O2% in case I want to get it topped off with air.
• The "O2 clean" sticker is there so the fill guy has a level of comfort about not blowing himself up, although in reality, it's a false sense of security.
• The yellow and green sticker is required only by places that like selling yellow and green stickers.
• The viz sticker certifies that at the time it was inspected, your tank wasn't full of crap or damaged inside. If it's an AL tank and has an eddy current certification, it means the neck has been inspected for cracks. IMO, these are both good things, although like "O2 Clean" viz is only really useful until the first fill. Then all bets are off.

flots.

 

[tbone1004]

my thoughts.

O2 gets an MOD sticker, always.
50% gets an MOD sticker, always. Whether it is 48 or 55 is pretty irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. 50mod is like 60fsw ish at 1.4, 55 is 50 ish at 1.4. You're not going to tox.

Travel gas for trimix dives gets labeled, usually 32%, so that gets labeled, but those bottles also get used for stages so temporary markers go in that *I also don't dive that much trimix, so it's pointless*

regular backgas/stage bottles don't have anything except a vip sticker on them and a small piece of painters tape with the mix % on them. You can put MOD if you want, but it isn't a requirement for most. It is important to know the MOD but since you aren't switching to that gas at depth you would violate a whole bunch of other things. The MOD stickers are primarily for deco bottles to make sure you don't switch to the wrong one at too deep and die from the free radicals bouncing around in your skull.

 

[rhwestfall]

for me:

all tanks with a VIP (indication of O2 clean as appropriate on the same sticker as a punch-out)

O2 just gets "oxygen".....
MOD on all other DECO mixes.
Tape on neck for MIX/MOD, etc. on back gas (may have "other than air" labels if He)
will decide on labeling stages, etc. when I get to using them...

I used to have the big old NITROX labels, but ditched them, except for an all black tank - like the visibility it gives.

YMMV